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BKTWEEN THE lATE 



COMMODORE STEPHEN DECATUR 



AJVD 



COMMODORE JAMES EARROK. 



WHICH lED TO 



THE UNFORTUNATE MEETING OF THE TWENTY-SECOND OF MARCH. 



WASHINGTON : 

HHTSTED BT GALES & S^ATOS. 
1820- 



<.\ ♦.tt\ 



t' . 55"3 



The friends of the late Commodore Decatur have 
learned, with very great regret, that misconceptions 
injurious to him prevail, and are extending, relative to 
the difference between him and Commodore Barron. 
To place the subject in its true light, they have 
thought it necessary to submit to the public, without 
comment, the whole correspondence which preceded 
the meetinar. 



No. 1. 

Hampton, Va. June 12,* 1819. 

Sir: I have been informed, in Norfolk, that you have said that 
you could insult me with impunity, or words to that effect. If you 
have said so, you will no doubt avow it, and I shall expect to hear 
from you. 

I am, sir, your obedient servant, 

JAMES BARRON. 
To Commodore Stephen Decatur, 
Washington* 



No. 2. 

"Washington, 17f/iJime, 1819. 

Sir: I have received your communication of the 13th instant. 
Before you could have been entitled to the information you have ask- 
ed of me, you should have given up the name of your informer. That 
frankness which ought to characterise our profession required it. I 
shall not, however, refuse to answer you on that account, but shall 
be as candid in my communication to you as your letter or the case 
will warrant. 

Whatever I may have tlwught, or said, in the verij frequent and 
free conversations I have had respecting you and your conduct, I feel a 
thorough conviction that I never could have been guilty of so much 
egotism as to say that " / could insult you" (or any other man) "with 
impunity." 

I am, sir, your obedient servant, 

STEPHEN DECATUR» 
To Commodore James Barron, 
Hampton, Virginia. 



* With respect to the date of this letter, it may be proper to observe, that, althougli 
it is 12l.h June, yet the figure 2, as made, might well be mistaken for a 3 : hence, in 
Com. Decatur's letter of reply, he considered the date to be loth June. On referring, 
however, to the post mark on the back of the letter, it was found to have been put 
into the post office on the 12th : hence, in Com. Decatur's letter to Com. Barron, of 
the 31st Uctober, 1819, it is recognized as dated on the 12th. 



No. 3. 

HA\rPTON, Va. June 25, 1819. 

Sir: Your communication of the 17th instant, in answer to mine 
of the 1 3th, I have received. 

The circumstances that urged me to call on you for the information 
requested in my letter, would, I presume, have instigated you, or any 
other person, to tlie same conduct that I pursued. Several gentlemen 
in Norfolk, not your enemies, nor actuated hy any malicious motive, 
told me that such a report was in circulation, but could not now be 
traced to its origin. I, therefore, concluded to appeal to you, suppos- 
ing, under such circumstances, that I could not outrage any rule of 
decorum or candor. This, I trust, will be considered as a just mo- 
tive for the course I have pursued. Your declaration, if J under- 
stand it cori'cctly, relieves my mind from the apprehension that you 
had so degraded my character, as I had been induced to allege. 

I am, sir, your obedient servant, 

JAMES BARRON. 

To Commodore Stephen Decatur, 

Washington. 



No. 4. 

Washington, June 29, 1819. 

Sir : I have received your communication of the 25th, in answer 
to mine of the 17th, and, as you have expressed yourself doubtfully, 
as to your correct understanding of my letter of the aforesaid date, 
I have now to state, and I request you to understand distinctly, that 
I meant no more than to disclaim the specific and particular expression 
to which your inquiry was directed, to wit: that I had said that I 
could insult you with impunity. As to the motives of the " several 
gentlemen in Norfolk," your informants, or the rumors which " can- 
not be traced to their origin," on which their information w^as found- 
ed, or who they are, is a matter of perfect indifference to me, as is 
also your motives in making such an inquiry upon such information. 
Your obedient servant, 

STEPHEN DECATUR. 

To Commodore James Barron, 

Hampton, Virginia. 



No. 5. 

Hampton, October 23, 181 9-. 

Sir : I had supposed that the measure of your ambition was near- 
ly completed, and that your good fortune had rendered your reputa- 
tion for acts of magnanimity too dear to be risked wantonly on occa- 
sions that can never redound to the honor of him that would be great, 
I had also concluded that your rancor towards me was fully satisfied, 
by the cruel and unmerited sentence passed upon me by the coui-t *of 
wliich you were a member,* and, after an exile from my country, fami- 
ly, and friends, of nearly seven years, I had concluded that I should 
now be allowed, at least, to enjoy that solace, with this society, that 
lacerated feelings like mine required, and that you would have suffered 
me to remain in quiet possession of those enjoyments; but, scarcely 
had I set my foot on my native soil, ere I learnt that the same ma- 
lignant spirit which had before influenced you to endeavor to ruin 
my reputation was still at work, and that you were ungenerously 
traducing my character whenever an occasion occurred which suited 
your views, and, in many instances, not much to your credit as an 
officer, through the medium of our juniors; such conduct cannot fail 
to produce an injurious effect on the discipline and subordination of 
the navy. A report of this sort, sir, coming from the respectable and 
creditable sources it did, could not fail to arrest my attention, and to 
excite those feelings which might naturally be expected to arise in 
tlie heart of every man who professes to entertain principles of honor, 
and intends to act in conformity with them. With such feelings I 
addressed a letter to you under date of the 13th June last, which pro- 
duced a correspondence between us, which I have since been informed 
you have endeavored to use to my farther injury, by sending it to 
Norfolk by a respectable officer of the navy, to be shewn to some of my 
particular friends, with a view of alienating from me their attach- 
ment. I am also informed that you have tauntingly and boastingl v 
observed, that you would cheerfully meet me in the field, and hoped I 
would yet act like a man, or that you had used words to that effect: 
such conduct, sir, on the part of any one, but especially one occupy- 
ing the influential station under the government which you hold, to- 
wards an individual, situated as I am, and oppressed as I have been, 
and that chiefly by your means, is unbecoming you as an officer and 
a gentleman; and shews a want of magnanimity which, hostile as 1 
have found you to be towards me, I had hoped for your own reputa- 
tion you possessed. It calls loudly for redress at your hands: I con- 
sider you as having given the invitation, which I accept, and will 
prepare to meet you at such time and place as our respective friends, 
hereafter to be named, shall designate. I also, under all the cir- 
cumstances of the case, consider myself entitled to the choice of wea- 
pons, place, and distance; but, should a difference of opinion be en- 
tertained by our friends, I flatter myself, fi'om your known personal 
courage, that you would disdain any unfair advantage, which youi 



8 

superiority in the use of the pistol, and the natural defect in my vi- 
sion, increased by age, would give you. I will thank you not to put 
your name on the cover of your answer, as, I presume, you can have 
no disposition to give unnecessary pain to the females of my family. 
I am, sir, your obedient servant, 

JAMES BARRON. 
Commodore Stephen Decatur, 
Washington. 



No. 6. 
Washington, 2>\st October, 1819. 

Sir: Your letter of the ^23d inst. has been duly received. Prior to giv- 
ing it that reply which 1 intend, its contents suggest the necessity of 
referring to our June correspondence. 

On tlie 12th June last, you addressed to me a note, inquiring 
whether I had said that "I could insult you with impunity." On 
the 17th June, I wrote to you, in reply, as follows: "Whatever I 
may have thought or said in the rerij frequent and free conversations 
I have had respecting you and your conduct^ I feel a thorough convic- 
tion tliat I never could have been guilty of so much egotism, as to say 
that / could insult you, or any other man, with impunity." 

On the 25th of June, you again wrote to me, and stated, that the 
report on which you had grounded your query of 12th June, "could 
not now be traced to its origin," and your letter is concluded in the 
following words: "your declaration, if I understand it correctly, re- 
lieves my mind from the apprehension that you had so degraded my 
character, as I had been induced to allege." Immediately on receiv- 
ing your letter of the 25th June, I wrote to you, 29th June, as fol- 
lows: "As you have expressed yourself doubtfully as to your correct 
understanding of my letter of the 17th June, I have now to state, and 
I request you to understand, distinctly, that I meant no more than to 
disclaim the specijic and particular expression, to which your inquiry 
was directed, to wit: "that I had said that I could insult you with im- 
punity." Here ended our June correspondence, and, with it, all kind 
of communication, till the date of your letter of the 23d inst. which I 
sliall now proceed to notice. 

Nearly four months having elapsed since the date of our last cor- 
respondence, your letter was unexpected to m«, particularly as the 
terms used by you, in the conclusion of your letter to me of 25th 
June, and your silence since receiving my letter of 29th June, indi- 
cated, as I thought, satisfaction on your part. But, it seems that you 
consider yourself aggrieved by my sending our June correspondence 
to Norfolk. I did not send the June correspondence to Norfolk, 
until three months had expired after your last communication. 



and not then, until I had been informed by a captain of the navy 
that a female of your acquaintance had stated, that such a con 
respondence had taken place.* If that correspondence has, in an} 
degree, **alienated your friends from you," such effect is to be at 
tributed to the correspondence itself. I thought the papers wouk 
speak for themselves, and sent them without written comment. 

With respect to the court martial upon you for the affair of the 
Chesapeake, toAvhichyou have been pleased to refer, I shall not trea< 
the officers, who composed that court, with so much disrespect, as to 
attempt a vindication of their proceedings. The chief magistrate oi 
our country approved them,* the nation approved them; and the sen- 
tence has been carried into effect. But, sir, there is a part of my 
conduct, on that occasion, which it does not appear irrelevant to re- 
vive in your recollection. It is this; I was present at the court of 
inquiry upon you, and heard the evidence then adduced for and against 
you; thence I drew an opinion altogether unfavorable to you; and, when 
I was called upon, by the Secretary of the Navy, to act as member of 
the court martial ordered for your trial, I begged to be excused the 
duty, on the ground of my having formed sucli an opinion. The ho- 
norable Secretary was pleased to insist on my serving; still anxious 
to be relieved from this service, I did, prior to taking my seat as a 
member of the court, communicate to your able advocate, general 
Taylor, the opinion I had formed, and my correspondence with the 
Navy Department upon the subject, in order to efibrd you an oi)por- 
tunity, should you deem it expedient, to jirotest against my being a 
member, on the ground of my not only Jiaving formed, but expressed 
an opinion unfavorable to you. You did not pi'otest against my be- 
ing a member. Duty constrained me, however unpleasant it was, 
to take my seat as a meml)er; I did so, and discharged the duty im- 
posed upon me. You, 1 find, are incapable of estimating tlic motives 
which guided my conduct in this transaction. 

For my conduct as a member of that court martial, I do not consi- 
der myself as, in any wa>> accountable to you. But, Sir, you have 
thought fit to deduce, from your impressions of my conduct as a mem- 
ber of that court martial, inferences of personal hostility towards you. 
Influenced by feelings thence arising, ymi commenced the June cor- 
respondence, a correspondence whicli I had hoped would have ter- 
minated our communications. 

Between you and myself, there never has been a personal differ- 
ence; but I have entertained, and do still entertain the opinion, that 
your conduct as an officer, since the affair of the Chesapeake, has been 
such as ought to forever bar your re-admission into the service. 

In my letter to you, of tlie 17th June, although I disavowed the 
particular expressions to which you invited my attention, candor re- 
quired that I should apprise you of my not having beeirsilcnt respecting 
you. I informed you that I had had very frequent and free conver- 
sations respecting you and your condtict; and the words were under- 



* Seo the extract from Captain Carter's letter, post, page 13. 



10 

scored, that they might not fail to attract your particular attention. 
Had you have asked what those frequent and free conversations were, 
1 should, with the same frankness, have told you; but, instead of 
making a demand of this kind, you reply to my letter of 17th June, 
*♦ That my declaration, if correctly understood by you, relieved your 
mind," &c. That you might correctly understand what I did mean, 
I addressed you, as before observed, on the 29th June, and endeavor- 
ed, by iinderscoring certain precise terms, to convey to you my pre- 
cise meaning. To this last letter I never received a reply. 

Under these circumstances, I have judged it expedient at this time, 
to state, as distinctly as may be in my power, the facts upon which I 
ground the unfavorable opinion which I entertain, and have express- 
ed, of your conduct as an ollicer, since the court martial upon youj 
while I disclaim all personal enmity towards yon. 

Some time after you liad been suspended from the service, for your 
conduct in the affair of the Chesapeake, you proceeded, in a merchant 
brig, from Norfolk to Pernambuco; and by a communication from 
the late Captain Lewis, wliose honor and veracity were never yet 
questioned, it api)ears — that you stated to Mr. Lyon, the British con- 
sul at Pernambuco, with whom you lived, "That if the Chesapeake 
had been prepared for action, you would not have resisted the attack 
of the Leopard; assigning, as a reason, that you knew, (as did also 
our government,) there were deserters on board your ship; that the 
President of the United States knew there were deserters on board, 
and of tlie intention of the British to take them; and that the Presi- 
dent caused you to go out in a defenceless state, for the express 
purpose of having your ship attacked and disgraced, and thus attain 
his favorite object of involving tlie United States in a war with Great 
Britain." For confirmation of this information. Captain Lewis re- 
fers to Mr. Thomas Goodwin, of Baltimore, the brother of Captain 
Bidgely, of the Navy, who received it from Mr. Lyon himself. Re- 
ference was made to Mr. Goodwin, who, in an oilicial communication, 
confirmed all that Captain Lewis had said. The veracity and re- 
spectability of Mr. Goodwill are also beyond question. You will be 
enabled to judge of the impression made upon Captain Lewis's mind, 
by the following strong remarks he made on the subject: 

" I am now convinced that Barron is a traitor, for I can call by 
no other name a man who w ould talk in this way to an Englishman, 
and an Englishman in office." 

Tliesc communications are now in the archives of the navy De- 
partment. 

If, sir, the affair of the Chesapeake excited the indignant feelings 
of the nation towards Great Britain; and was, as every one admits, 
one of the principal causes which produced the late war, did it notbe- 
hcrvc you to take an active part in the war, for your own sake? — Pa- 
triotism out of the question ! But, sir, instead of finding you in the 
foremost ranks, on an occasion which so emphatically demanded 
your best exertions, it is said, and is credited, that you were, after 



11 

the commencement of the war, to be found in the command of a ves- 
sel sailing under British license ! Though urged, by your friends, to 
avail yourself of some one of the opportunities which were every day 
occurring, in pi-ivatecrs, or other fest sailing merchant vessels, sail- 
ing from France, and other ])laces, to return to your country during 
the war,* it is not known that you maniftsted a disposition to do so, 
excepting in the siugle instance by the cartel John Adams, in which 
vessel, you must have known, you could not be permitted to return, 
without violating her cliaracter as a cai'tel. 

You say you have been oppressed. You know, sir, that, by ab- 
senting yourself, as you did for years, from the country, without 
leave from the government, you subjected yourself to be stricken 
from the rolls. You know, also, that, by the 10th article of the act 
for the better government of the Navy, all persons in the Navy hold- 
ing inter-course with an enemy, become subject to the severest pu- 
nishment known to our laws. You have not, for the offences before 
stated, to my knowledge, received even a reprimand; and I do know, 
that your pay, even during your absence, has been continued to you. 

As to my iiaving spoken of you injuriously to <* junior officers," I 
have to remark, that such is the state of our service that we have 
but few seniors. If I speak with officers at all, the probability is, it 
will be with a junior. 

On your return to this country, your efforts to re-establish yoursellT 
in the service were known, and became a subject of conversation 
with officers as well as others. In the many and free conversations 
I have had respecting you and your conduct, I ha^e said, for the 
causes above cnumet'ated, that, in my opinion, you ought not to be 
received again into the naval service; that there was not employment 
for all the officers who had faithfully discharged their duty to their 
country in the hour of trial; and that it would be doing an act of in- 
justice to employ you, to the exclusion of any one of them. In speak- 
ing thus, and endeavouring to prevent your re-admission, I conceive 
that I was performing a duty I owe to the service; that I was contri- 
buting to the preservation of its respectability. Had you have made 
no effort to be re-employed, after the war, it is more than prubable I 
might not have spoken of you. If you continue your efforts, I shall 
certainly, from the same feelings of ])ublic duty by which I have hi- 
therto been actuated, be constrained to continue the expression of my 
opinions; and I can assure you, that, in the interchange of opinions 
with other officers respecting you, I have never met with more than 
one who did not entirely concur with me. 

The objects of your communication of the 23d, as expressed by 
you, now claim my notice. You profess to consider me as having 
given you " an invitation." You say that you have been told, that I 
have *• tauntingly and boastingly observed, that I would cheerfully 
meet you in the field, and hoped you would yet act like a man." 

One would naturally have supposed, that, after having been so re- 
cently led into error by '• rumors" which could not be traced, you 
would have received, with some caution, subsequent rumors; at 9\\ 



12 

ivents that you uotild liave endeavored to have traced them, before 
igain venturing to act upon them as if they were true. Had you 
pave pursued this course, you would have discovered, that the latter 
pumois wej-e equally unfounded as the former. 

1 1 never invited you to the field; nor have I expressed a hope that 
fou would call me out. I was informed, by a gentleman with whom 
-j'ou liad conferred upon the subject, that you left Norfolk for this 
^.lace, sometime before our June correspondence, with the intention 
of calling me out. I then stated to that gentleman, as I have to 
i\.\\ others with whom I have conversed upon the subject, that, if you 
made the call, I would meet you; but that, on all scores, I should be 
much better pleased, to have nothing to do w ith you. I do not think 
I hat fighting duels, under any circumstances, can raise the reputation 
of any man, and have long since discovered, that it is not even an 
uiieiring criterion of personal courage. I should regret the necessity 
of fighting \N ith any man; but, in my opinion, the man who makes arms 
his proj'tssion, is not at liberty to decline an invitation from any person, 
who is not so far degraded, as to be beneath his notice. Having in- 
cautiously said I would meet you, I will not now consider this to be 
your case, although many think so; and if I had not pledged myself, 
I might reconsider the case. 

As to '• weapons, place, and distance," if we are to meet, those 
poiiits will, as is usual, be committed to the friend I may select on 
the occasion. As far, however, as it may be left to me, not having 
any particular prejudice in favor of any particular arm, distance, or 
mode, (but, on the contrary, disliking them all,) I should not be found 
fastidious on those points, but should be rather disposed to yield you 
any little advantage of this kind. As to my skill in the use of the 
pistol, it exists more in your imagination than in reality; for the last 
twenty years I have had but little practice; and the disparity in our 
ages, to which you have been pleased to refer, is, I believe, not more 
than five or six years. It would have been out of the common course 
of nature, if the vision of either of us had been improved by years. 

From your manner of proceeding, it appears to me, that you have 
come to the determination to figiit some one, and that you have se- 
lected me for that purpose; and I must take leave to observe, that 
your object would have been better attained, had you have made this 
decision during our late war, when your fighting might have Ijene- 
fitted your country as well as yourself. The style of your communi- 
cation, and the matter, did not deserve so dispassionate and histori- 
cal a notice as I have given it; and had I believed it would receive 
no other inspection than yours, I should have spared myself the trou- 
ble. The course I adopted with our former correspondence, I shall 
pursue with this, if I shall deem it expedient. 

I am, sir, your obedient servant, 

STEPHEN DECATUR. 

To Commodore James Barrox, 

Ham-ptoth Virginia. 



18 

^EXTBACT.] 

Norfolk, 24 /A August, 1819. 

My Dear Commodore: Nothing had transpired here previous to 
my arrival on the subject of the correspondence; but a Lady, a Miss 
******, I think her name is, from Hampton, has stated, that a cor- 
respondence had taken place between you and B. which she feared 
would end in a meeting. The fears of this lady are at direct va- 
riance with the opinion of your friends here, who think that he does 
not purpose saying more on the subject. 

As it seems that it was known at Hampton, and even here, that let- 
ters had passed between you and B. may I venture to ask you to send 
a copy of them to Mr. Tazewell, who I have just left. He will, with 
great pleasure, he says, attend to your wishes. 

Receive the best wishes of your friend. 

W. CARTER, 

Commodore Decatur. 



No. 7. 

Wa SHINGTON, JS*ovemberf 1 8 1 9* 

Sir : Since my communication to you of the Slst ult. I have been 
informed by a gentleman entitled to the fullest credit, that you were 
not afloat till after the peace; consequently, the report which I noticed 
of your having sailed under British license must be unfounded. 
I am, sir, your obedient servant, 

STEPHEN DECATUR. 

Com. Jas. BARROjf. 



No. 8. 

Hampton, JVov, 20, 1819. 

Sir : Unavoidable interruption has prevented my answering your 
two last communications as early as it was my wish to have done, but 
in a few days you shall have my reply. 

I am, sir, your obedient servant, 

TAS. BARRON, 
Com. Stephen Decatur. 



14 

No. 9. 



Hampton, 30ih J^ov. 1819. 



SiK: I (lid not receive, until Tuesday, the 9th inst. your very 
Icn.qthy, elaboi-ate, and historical reply, without date, to my letter 
to you of the 2Sd ultimo; which, from its nature and ohject, did not, 
I conceive, rcqiiiie that you siiould liave entered so mucli into detail, 
in defence of the hostile and unmanly course you have pursued to- 
wards me, since the ** affair of the Chesapeake," as you term it. 
A much more laconic answer would have served my purpose, which, 
for the presejit, is nothini^ more than to obtain at your hands honor- 
able redress for the accumulated insults which you, sir, in particu- 
lar, above all my enemies, have attempted to heap upon me, in every 
shape in which they could be offered. Your last voluminous letter 
is alone suflicient proof, if none other existed, of the rancorous dis- 
position you entertain towards me, and the extent to which you have 
carried it. That letter I sliould no otherwise notice, than merely 
to inform you it had i-eached me, and that I am prepared to meet 
you in the field upon any tJdng like fair and equal grounds; but, in- 
asmiicli as you have intimated that our correspondence is to go be- 
fore the public, I feel it a duty I owe to myself, and to the world, to 
reply paiticularly to the many calumnious charges and aspersions 
with which your '* dispassionate and historical notice" of my com- 
munication so abundantly teems; wishing you, sir, at the same time, 
" distinctly to understand" tliat it is not for you alone, or to justify 
myself in your estimation, that I take this course. You have dwelt 
much upon our "June correspondence," as you stile it, and have 
made many quotations from it. I deem it unnecessary, however, to 
advert to it, further than to remark, tliat, although " nearly four 
months" did intervene between tliat correspondence and my letter of 
the 23d ultimo, my silence arose not from any misapprehension of 
the purport of your contumacious *' nnderscored" remarks, nor from 
the malicious designs they indicated, nor from a tame disposition to 
yield quietly to the operation which either might have against me; 
but, from a tedious and painful indisposition, which confined me to 
my bed the cliief part of that period, as is well known to almost 
every person here. I anticipated, however, from what I had found 
you capable of doing to my injury, the use to which you would en- 
deavour to pervert that correspondence; and have not at all been 
disappointed. So soon as I was well enough, and heard of your 
machinations against me, I lost no time in addressing to you my 
letter of the 23d ultimo; your rejily to which I have now more par- 
ticularly to notice. I have not said, nor did I mean to convey such 
an idea, nor will my letter bear the interpretation, that your 
forwarding to Norfolk our *• June correspondence" had, *• in any 
degree, alienated my friends from me;" but, that it was sent down 
there with that view. It is a source of great consolation to me, sir, 
to know, that I have more friends, both in and out of the navy, than 



15 

you are aware 6f ; and that it is not in your power, great as you 
may imagine your olficial influence to be, to deprive me of their good 
opinion and affection. As to the reason which seems to have 
prompted you to send that correspondence to Norfolk, " that a fe- 
male of my acquaintance had stated that such an one had taken 
place," I will only remark, that she did not derive her information 
from me: that it has alw ays been, and ever will be, with me, a prin- 
ciple, to touch as delicately as possible, upon reports said to come 
(rom females J intended to affect injuriously the character of any one; 
and that, in a correspondence like the present, highly as I estimate 
the sex, I should never think of introducing them as authority. 
Females, sir, have nothing, or ought to have nothing to do in con- 
troversies of this kind. In speaking of the court martial which sat 
upon my trial, I have cast no imputation or reflection upon the 
members individually who composed it (saving yourself) which re- 
quired that you should attempt a vindication of their proceedings; 
champion as you are, and hostile as some of them may have been to 
me: nor does the language of my letter warrant any such inference. 
I merely meant to point out to you, sir, what you appear to have 
been incapable of perceiving — the indelicacy of your conduct, (to say 
the least of it) in hunting me out as an object for malignant persecu- 
tion, after having acted as one of my judges, and giving your voice 
in favour of a sentence agaijist me, which I cannot avoid repeating, 
was " cruel and unmerited." It is the privilege, sir, of a man 
deeply injured as I have been by that decision, and conscious of 
his not deserving it, as I feel myself, to remonstrate against it; and 
I have taken the liberty to exercise tliat privilege. 

You say that "the proceedings of the Court have been approved by 
the Chief Magistrate of our country, that the nation approved of them, 
and that the sentence has been carried into effect." It is true the 
President of the United States did approve of that sentence, and that 
it was carried into effect — Full and complete effect, which I should 
have supposed ought to have glutted the envious and vengeful dispo- 
sition of your heart; but I deny that the nation lias approved of that 
sentence, and as an appeal appears likely to be made to them, I am 
willing to submit the question. Tlie part you took on that occasion, 
it was totally unnecessary, I assure you, "to revive in my recollec- 
tion;" it is indelibly imprinted on my mind, and can never, while I 
have life, be erased. You acknowledge you were present at the Court 
of Inquiry in my case, " heard the evidence for and against me, and 
had, therefore, formed and expi-essed an opinion unfavorable to me," 
and yet, your conscience was made of such pliable materials, that, 
becmise the then " honorable Secretary of the Navy was pleased to in- 
sist on your serving as a member of tlie Court Martial, and because 
/ did not protest against it," you conceive that " duty constrained you, 
however unpleasant, to take your seat as a member," although you 
were to act under the solemn sanction of an oath, to render me impar- 
tial jtisticeupon the very testimony whicli had been delivered in your 



16 

hearing before the Court of Inquiry, and from whicli you " drew an 
opinion, altogether unfavorable to 7ne." How such conduct can be re- 
conciled with the principles of common honor and justice, is to me in- 
explicable. Under such circumstances, no consideration, no power or 
authority on earth, could, or ought to, have forced any liberal high 
minded man to sit in a case which he had prejudged, and, to retort 
upon you your own expressions, you must have been ** incapable of 
seeing the glaring impropriety of your conduct, for which, although 
you do not conceive yourself in any way accountable to me," I hope 
you will be able to account for it with your God, and your conscience. 

You say, between you and myself, there never has been a personal 
difference, " and you disclaim all personal enmity towards me." If 
every step you have taken — every word you have uttered, and every 
line you have written, in relation to me — if your own admission of the 
very frequent and free conversations you have had respecting me, 
and my conduct, " since the affair of the Chesapeake," bear not the 
plainest stamp of personal hostility, I know not the meaning of such 
terms; were you not under the influence of feelings of this sort, why 
not, in your official capacity, call me, or have me brought, before a 
proper tribunal, to answer the charges you have preferred against 
me, and thereby giving me a chance of defending myself? Why speak 
injuriously of me to junior officers * which you do not deny?* Why 
the " many frequent and free conversations respecting me and my 
conduct," which you have taken so much pains to underscore? Why 
use the insulting expression, that you " entertained, and still do en- 
tertain, the opinion that my conduct, as an officer, since that * af- 
fair' has been such as ought forever to bar my readmission into tlie 
service," and that, in endeavoring to prevent it, " you conceive you 
were performing a duty you owe to the service, and were contri- 
buting to its respectability"? Why the threat, that if I continued the 
** efforts" yon say I have been making, to be ** re-employed" you 
** certainly should be constrained to continue the expressions of those 
** opinions?" 

Does not all this, together with the whole tenor and tendency ol 
your letter, manifest the most marked ;>erso7iai animosity against me, 
which an honorable man, acting under a sense of public duty by 
which you profess to ** have been hitherto actuated," would disdain 
even to shew, much more to feel? 

1 shall now, sir, take up the specific cliarges you liave alleged 
against me, and shall notice them in the order in which they stand. 
The first is one of a very heinous character. It is, that " I proceeded 
in a merchant brig to Pernambuco." Could I, sir, during the pe- 
riod of my suspension, have gone any where in a national vessel ? 
Could I, with what was due to my family, have remained idle? The 
sentence of the Court deprived them of the principal means of sub 
sistence. I was therefore compelled to resoi't to that description of 
employment with which I was best acquainted; and on this subject 
ymi should have been silent. But you add, that the late Captain 
Lewis, of the Navy, who had it from a Mr. Goodwin, who heard i1 



1 / 

fiom Mr. Lyon, the British Consul at Pernambuco, with whom you 
undertake to say I lived, represented me as stating, "that, if the Che- 
sapeake Iiad been prepared for action, I would not have resisted the 
attack of the Leopard^ assigning, as a reason, that I knew, as also 
did our government, that there were deserters on board tJie Chesa- 
peake: and that I said to Mr. Lyon, further, that tlie President of the 
United States knew thei-e were deserters on board, and of the inten- 
tion of the British ship to take them, and that the ship was ordered 
out under these circumstances, with a view to bring about a contest 
which might embroil the two nations in a war.'* 

The whole of this. Sir, I pronounce to be a falseliood, a ridicnloits, 
malicious, absurd, improbable falsehood, which can never be credit- 
ed by any man that docs not feel a disposition to impress on the 
opinion of the public that I am an idiot. Th.at I should, two years 
after the affair of the Chesapeake, make such a declaration, when 
every proof that could be lerpiired of a contrary disposition on the 
part of the Chief Magistrate liad been given, cannot receive credit 
from any one, but those that are disposed to consider me such a 
character as you would represent rae to he, I did not live with Mr. 
Lyon, nor did I ever liold a conversation with him so indelicate as 
the one stated in captain Lcv/is' letter would have been. And with 
what object could I have made such a communication? Mr. 
Lyon would naturally have felt a contempt for a man that 
would have suifcred himself to have been made a tool of in so 
disgraceful an affair. I found Mr. Lyon transacting business in 
Pernanibnco: he produced to me a letter from Mr. Hill, the Ameri- 
can consul in that country, recommending him as entitled to the con- 
fidence of his countrymen, every one of whom, in that port, pirt 
their business into his hands. I did the same, and thus commenced 
our acquaintance; he was kind and friendly to me, but never in any 
respect indelicate, as would have been, in a high degree, such con- 
versation between us. Of Mr. Goodwin I know nothing. I have never 
seen him in all my life, nor do I conceive that his hearsay evidence tan 
ever be of any kind of consequence against me; I was thefirst that in- 
formed the President, and the Secretary of the Navy, that such a let- 
ter was in the Department, even before I had seen it; and, again, if 
the mere oral testimony of a British agent was to be considered as 
evidence sufficient to arraign an American officer, I tiiink the nav\- 
would quickly be in such a state, as it might be desirable for their na- 
tion to place it in. As to the impressions made upon the mind of capt. 
Lewis, from this information^ and the "strong remarks" he made 
upon the subject, which you have tliought proper to quote, they by no 
means establish the correctness of t/iut ijiforniation; but only go to 
shew the effect it produced upon the mind of an individual, who seems 
to have imbibed a prejudice against r.ie, no otherwise to be accounted 
for, except your acquaintance w ith him. He is now in his grave, 
and I am perfectly disposed there to let him rest; you must, however, 
have been hard pressed indeed, to be compelled to resort to such 
flimsy grounds as those, a degree weaker than even second handed 



18 

testimony, to support your charges against rae. These communi- 
cations, you obseiTe, are now in the archives of the Navy Depart- 
ment. Ot'tliis fact. Sir, I had long been apprised; and had you, when 
searching the records of that Department for documents to injure 
my character, looked a little further back, you would perhaps have 
found others calculated to produce a very different effect. Of my desire 
to return to the United States, during the late war, there are certifi- 
cates in the Navy Department of the first respectability, which, if you 
had been disposed to find and quote, are perhaps laying on tiie same 
shelf from whence you took those, that you appear so anxious to bring 
to public view; I mean my letter applying for service, as soon as an 
opportunity ofTered, after the term of my suspension expired; and one 
letter, above all, tjou should not have passed over unnoticed, that 
Avhich you received from my hand of May, 1803, addressed to the 
Secretary of the Navy, which was one of the principal causes of your 
obtaining the first command that you ^^ere ever honored witli, and 
us you may have forgotten it, I will remind you, on this occasion, 
tliut, but little more than one month previous to the date of that letter, 
1, by my advice and arguments, saved you from resigning the ser- 
vice of your country in a pet, because you were removed from the first 
lieutenancy of the New York, to that of second of the Chesapeake: 
but all this and much more is now foi-gotten by yon, yet there arc 
ethers that recollect those circumstances, and the history of your con- 
duct to me will outlive you, let my fate be what it may. The affair 
of the Chesapeake did certainly "excite,*' and ought to have excited, 
the indignant feelings of the nation towards Great Britain; but, 
})o\vever it may have justified a declaration of war against that pow- 
er, it was not, as you assert "every one admits," one of the principal 
causes of the late war. That did not take place, sir, until^xT years after, 
when that affair had been amicably and of course honorably adjusted 
between the two nations. I mentio)i this fact, not on account of its 
importance, but because you have laid so much stress on that "affair," 
as a reason why I ought to have returned home during tlie late war, 
and to shew that, although it did happen to be your fortunate lot to 
have an opportunity of being in the foremost rank, on that occasion, 
of which you seem inclined to vaunt, you are ignorant even of the 
causes which led to it. Having, in your letter of tl-.e 5th inst. aban- 
doned the charge of my having sailed under "British licence," after 
the commencement of the late war, in consequence of information 
received by you from a gentleman entitled to the fullest credit, that 
I was not afloat, until after the peace, consequently the report 
which you noticed of my having sailed under British license, must 
be unfounded. I have only to remark, on this head, that, in ad- 
vancing a charge against me of so serious a nature, and designed 
and so well calculated, as it was, to affect, materially, my reputation, 
not only as an officer of the navy, but as a citizen of the United 
States, you should first have ascertained that it was founded on fact, 
and not on rumor, which you so much Aarp upon; and that upon a 
proper investigation you would have discovered your other accusa- 



19 

tions to be equally groundless. For ttiy not returning home during 
the late war, I do not hold myself, to use your own expressions, "lu 
any way accountable to you," Sir. It would be for the government, 
I should suppose, to take notice of my absence, if they deemed it 
reprehensible; and they no doubt would have done so, had not the 
circumstances of the case, in their estimation, justified it. That they 
are perfectly satisfied upon this point, I have good reason to believe, 
and trust I shall be able to satisfy my country also. The President's 
personal conduct to me, and the memorial of the Virginia Delegation 
in Congress, to him, prove how I stand with those high characters, 
your opinion, notwithstanding, to the contrary. I deny, Sir, that I 
ever was *'urged" by my friends, as yuu in mockery term them, to 
return home during the late war, nor could it have been lequisite for 
me to have been "urged" to do so by any one. Laying patriotism out 
of the question, as you observe, as well as the reasons why you 
think "it behoved me" to adopt that course, there were other incen- 
tives strong enougli, God knows, to excite a desire oh my part to 
return,* and I should have returned, Sir» but for circumstances beyond 
my control, which is not incumbent on me to explain to you. 

Had the many opportunities really presented themselves which you 
allege were *'every day occurring," of which I might have availed 
myself to return to my country, in privateers or other fast sailing 
merchant vessels, from France and other places, but of which you 
produce no other proof than random assertion, on which most of your 
other cliarges rest ? There were no such opportunities, as you say 
were "every day occurring;" no, not one within my reach, and for 
some considerable time after the news of the war arrived in Denmark, 
it was not believed that it would continue six months; but, if I had 
received the slightest intimation from the department that I should 
have been employed on my return, I should have considered no sacri- 
fice too great, no exertion within my i)ower should have been omitted 
to obtain so desirable an object, as any mark of my country's confi- 
dence would have been to me in such a moment: a gun boat, under 
my own orders, would not have been refused; but what hope had I, 
w hen my letter of application for service was not even honored by 
an answer. In regard to the John Adams, I do not deem it proper 
on this occasion to explain my reasons for making the attempt to re- 
turn in that ship; but whenever I am called on by any person proper- 
ly authorized to make the enquiry, I am confident that I shall convince 
them, that I had good reason to believe that I should obtain a passage 
in her, notwithstanding your great knowledge on the occasion. 

You say, by absenting myself, /or t/mrs, fi-om the country, without 
leave from the government, I "subjected myself to be stricken from 
the rolls." I knew also, by the 10th article of the act for the better 
government of the navy, that all persons in the navy holding inter- 
course with an enemy, became subject to the severest punishment 
known to the law; and that, for these offences, as you are pleased to 
term them, "I have not received, to your knowledge, even a rcpri- 



20 

mand;" but I plrsume if I have not it is not your i'anlt. What kind 
and humane forbearance this, after what 1 have already enduj-ed! But, 
sir, as you seem to be so very intelligent upon other points, jjray tell 
me w here was the necessity of my asking for a furlough until tlie pe- 
riod of my suspension expired, or even after having reported my- 
self for duty without being noticed. As to the charge of my holding 
intercourse with the enemy, I am at a loss to conceive to what you 
allude, and should degrade myself by giving it any other reply than 
to pronounce it — if you mean to insinuate there was any unlawful or 
improper communication on my part with tlie government, or any 
individual of Great Britain, as a false and foul aspersion on my cha- 
ractei-, which no conduct or circumstance of my life, however it might 
be tortured by your malice or ingenuity, can, in any manner, justi- 
fy or support. You say, also, that you do know " that my pay, even 
during my absence, was continued to mt." It is not tiie fact, sir; I ne- 
ver, aiid until very recently since my return, received but half pay. 
This part of your letter J should not have regarded, were it not to 
shew wit!i what boldness, facility, and sangfroid^ you can make as- 
sertions unsustaincd by the shadow of trutli; but, if you had made 
yourself accjuainted with the circumstances relative to my half pay, 
you w ould lia\ c found that not one cent of it was received by me. The 
government was so good as to pay the amount to my unfortunate fe- 
male family, whose kindest entertainment you have frequently en- 
joyed. Poor unfortunate childi-en! whose ancestors, every man of 
them, did contribute every disposable shilling of their property, ma- 
ny of them their lives, and all of them their best exertions, to estab^ 
lish the independence of their country, should now be told that the 
small amount of my half pay was considered, by an officer of high 
rank, too much for them! You have been good enough to inform 
me that, on my return to this country, my "^b?'/,s," as you liave been 
pleased to call them, "to re-instate myself in the service were known, 
and became a subject of conversation with officers, as well as others;'* 
and, but for those ** efforts," it is inwe than 'probable you would not 
have spoken of me. This would indeed have displayed a wonderful 
degree of lenity and courtesy on your part, of which I could not have 
failed to be duly sensible. But, sir, I beg leave to ask how, and 
where, did you get your information, that such " eftbrts'' were made 
by me; and even admit they were, why should you alone, disclaiming, 
as you pretend to do, all " personal enmity^* against me, have made 
yourself so particularly busy on the occasion? Was it because your 
inflated pride led you to believe that. the weight of your influence was 
greater than that of any other officer of the navy, or that you were 
more tenacious of its honor and "respectability," than the rest of the 
officers were? You assure me, however, * that, in the interchange 
of opinion with other officers respecting me, you have never met with 
m«re than one who did not entirely concur with you in the opinion 
you have expressed of me.* Indeed ! and what is the reason? It is 
because 1 suppose you are most commonly attended by a train of de- 



2t 

pendents, "wlio, to enjoy the sunshine of your favor, act as caterers 
for your Aanityj and, revolving around you like saiellites, borrow 
theii' chief consequence from the countenance you may condescend to 
bestow upon them. You, at length, arrive at the main point; tlie '•ob- 
ject" of my letter of the 23d ultimo, which you might have reached 
by a much shorter rmitCf and have saved me the fatigue of being com- 
pelled, in self defence, to travel with you so far as you have gone. 
The language of defiance, represented to have been used by you, * that 
you would cheerfully meet me in the field, and hoped 1 would yet act 
like a man,' are disavowed by you. And you furtlier deny having ever 
invited me to the field, or expressed a hope that I would call you 
out; but you observe that, * being informed by a gentleman with 
whom I liad conferred upon the subject, that I left Norfolk, for the 
seat of government, some time before our June correspondence, with 
the intention of calling you out, you stated to that gentlemen, 
as you have to all others with whom you have conversed upon the 
subject, that, if I made the call, you would meet me; but that, upon 
all scores, you would be much better pleased to have nothing to do 
with me.' 1 certainly do not exactly know who that intermeddling 
gentleman was, with whom you say I " conferred;" but, if I may be 
allowed a conjecture, I think I can recognize in him the self same 
officious gentleman^ who, I am creditably informed, originated the re- 
port of your having made use of the gasconading expressions you 
have disowned: — In this respect I may be mistaken. Be this, how- 
ever, as it may, I never gave liim, oi- any other person, to understand 
that my visit to Washington last spring was for tiie purpose of" call- 
ing you out," nor did I go there with any such view. 

How you can reconcile your affecting indifference towards me, in 
the remark " that, on all scores, you would be much better pleased to 
have nothing to do with me," with the very active part which, it is 
generally known, and which your own letter clearly evinces, you have 
taken against me,I am at a loss to conceive. No,sir, you feel not so much 
unconcern as you pretend and wish it to be believed you do, in regard 
to the course of conduct my lunior and my injuries may, in my judg- 
ment, require me to ])ursue. You have a motive, not to be concealed 
from the world, for all you have done or said, or for any future endea- 
vors you may make, to bar my "re-admission" into the service. It is 
true, you have never given me a direct, formal, and written, invi- 
tation to meet you in the field, such as one gentleman o( honor ought 
to send to another. But, if your own admissions, that you liad " in- 
cautiously said you would meet me if I wished it," and <• tliat if you 
had not pledged yourself , you might re-consider the subject," and all 
this too without any provocation on my part, or the most distant in- 
timation from me that I had a desire to meet you, do not amount to 
a challenge, I cannot comprehend the object or import of such de- 
clarations — made as they were in the face of the world; and to those 
in particular, whom you knew would not only communicate them to 
me, but give them circulation; under all the circumstances of the case, 
I consider you as having thrown down the gauntlet, and I have no 



22 

hesitation in accejiting it. This is, however, a point which it will not 
he for you or me to decide, nor do I view it as of any other impor- 
tance than as respects tlie privilege allowed to the challenged party 
in relation to the choice of weapons, distance, &c. about which I feel 
Jiot more " fastidious," I assure you, sir, than you do; nor do I claim 
any advantage whatever, which I have no right to insist upon; could I 
stoop so low as to solicit any, I know you too well to believe you would 
have any inclination to concede them. All I demand is to be placed 
upon erpial grounds with you; such as two honorable men may decide 
upon, as just and proper. Upon the subject of duelling, I perfectly 
coincide with the opinions you have expressed. I consider it as a 
barbarous pi-actice which ought to be exploded from civilized society; 
hut, sir, tliere may be causes of such extraordinary and aggravated 
insult and injuiy, received by an individual, as to render an appeal 
to arn)s, on his part, absolutely necessary; mine I conceive to bo a 
case of that description, and I feel myself constrained, by every tie 
that binds me to society, by all that can make life desirable to me, to 
resort to this mode of obtaining that redress due to me at your hands, 
as the only alternative which now seems to present itself for the pre- 
servation of my honor. 

To conclude : you say, " from my manner of proceeding, it ap- 
pears to you that I have come to the determination to fight some one, 
and that I have selected you for that purpose." To say nothing of 
the vanity you display, and the importance you seem to attach to 
yourself, in thus intimating, that, being resolved io fight myselfinto 
favor, I could no otherwise do so than by fixing upon you, the very 
reverse of which you infer is the fact; I never wished to fight in this 
way, and, had you permitted me to remain at i-est, I should not have 
disturbed you; I should have pursued the " even tenor of my way," 
without regarding you at all. But this would not have suited your am- 
bitious views. You have hunted me out, have persecuted me with all 
the power and influence of your office, and have declared your deter- 
mination to attempt to drive me from the navy, if I should make any 
"efforts" to he employed, and for what j)urpose, or from what other 
motive than to obtain my rank, I know not : if my life will give it 
to you, you shall have an opportunity of obtaining it. And now, 
sir, I have only to add, that, if you will make known your determi- 
nation, and the name of your friend, I will give that of mine, in order 
to complete tlie necessary arrangements to a final close of this affair. 
I can make no other apology for the apparent tardiness of this com- 
munication, than merely to state, that, being on very familiar terms 
\s ith my family, out of tenderness to their feelings, I have written 
under great restraint. 

1 am, sir, your obedient servant, 

JAMES BARRON. 



23 

No. 10. 

Washingtox, 9.9th December f 1819. 

Sra : Your commimication of the 30th ultimo readied me as I was 
on the ^ve of my departure for the north; whence I did not return 
till the 22d instant. It was my determination, on tlve. receipt of your 
letter, not to notice it; but, upon more mature reflection, I conceive, 
that as I have suffered myself to be drawn into this unprofitable dis- 
cussion, I oiiglit not to leave the false coloring and calumnies, which 
you have introduced into your letter, unanswered. You state, that 
a much more laconic reply to your letter of 23d October would have 
served your purpose. Of this I have no doubt; and to have insured 
such an answer, you had only to make a laconic call. I had already 
informed you of tiie course I had felt myself bound to pursue respect- 
ing you, and of the reasons which induced my conduct, and that, if 
you required it, I would overcome my own disinclination, and fight 
you. Instead of calling me out for injuries which you chose to insist 
that 1 have heaped upon you, you have thought fit to enter into this 
war of words. 

I reiterate to you, that I have not challenged, nor do I intend to 
challenge you. I do not consider it essential to my reputation that I 
should notice any thing which may come from you, the more particu- 
larly, when you declare your sole object, in wishing to draw the 
ehalleugc from me, is, that you may avail yourself of the advantages 
which rest with the challenged. It is evident, that you think, or your 
friends for you, that a figlit will help you; but, in fighting, you wish to 
incur the least possible risk. Now, sir, not believing that a fight of 
this nature will raise me at all in public estimation, but may even 
have a contrary effect, I do not feel at all disposed to remove the difli- 
culties that lay in your way. If we fight, it must be of your seeking; 
and you must take all the risk and all the inconvenience which usual- 
ly attend the challenger, in such cases. 

You deny having made the communication to the British consul at 
Pernambuco, which captain Lewis and Mr. Goodwin have repre- 
sented. The man capable of making such a communication, would 
not hesitate in denying it; and, until you can bring forward some 
testimony, other than your own, you ought not to expect that the 
testimony of those- gentlemen will be discredited. As to the veracity 
of the British consul, I can prove, if necessary, that you have, your- 
self, vouched for that. 

You offer, as your excuse for not returning to your country, during 
©ur war with England, that you had not been invited home by the § 
then Secretary, notwithstanding you had written him, expressive of | 
your wishes to be employed. You state, that, if you " had received 
the slightest intimation from the Department, that you would have 
been employed on your return, you would have considered no sacri- k 
fice too great, no exertion within your power should have been omit- • 
ted to obtain so desirable an object." From this, I would infer, that, 
in consequence of not receiving this intimatioDy you did not make the 



24 

exGrtious in your power to return, and this I hold to be an insufficient 
excuse. You do not pretend to have made any attempt, except by 
the way of the cartel, the Jolin Adams. You cannot believe, that 
I'cporting yourself to the Department, at the distance of 4,000 miles, 
when the same conveyance whicli brought your letter would have 
brought yourself, will be received as evincing suflicient zeal to join 
the arms of your country: and, besides, you say it was not believed, 
for a considerable time aftei* the news of war ari'ived in Denmark, 
that the war would last six m ^nths. With those impressions, you 
must have known, that it would have occupied at least that time for 
your letter to have arrived at the Department, you to receive an 
answer, and then to repair to America. You deny that the oppor- 
tunities of returning were frequent. The custom house entries at 
Baltimore and New York alone, from the single port of Bordeaux, 
will show nearly an hundred arrivals: and it is well known, that it 
required only a few days to perform the journey from Copenhagen 
to Bordeaux, by the ordinary course of post. Yon deny having 
been advised to return to tliis country, by your fi'iemh, during the 
war. Mr. Cook, of Norfolk, your relative, says, he wrote to you to 
that effect; and Mr. Forbes, then our consul at Copenhagen, who is 
now at this place, says, he urged you in person to do so. 

You have charged the officers who concur with me in opinion re- 
specting your claims to service, as being my satellites. I think I 
am not mistaken, when I inform you, that all the officers of our 
grade, your superiors as well as inferiors, w ith the exception of one, 
who is your junior, concur in the opinion, that you ought not to be 
employed again, whilst the imputations, which now lie against you, 
remain: nor have they been less backward than myself in expressing 
their opinions. 

Your chaigc of my wishing to obtain your rank, will apply to 
all who are your juniors, with as much force as to myself. You 
never have interfered with me in the service, and, at the I'isk of 
being esteemed by you a little vain, I must sa}', I do not think you 
ever will. \Vere I disposed to kill out of my way, as you have been 
pleased to insinuate, those who interfere with my advancement, 
there ai'c otliers, my superiors, who I consider fairly barring my 
pretensions; and it would serve such purpose better, to begin with 
them. You say, you were the means of obtaining me the first com- 
mand I ever had in the service. I deny it: I feel that I owe my 
standing in the service to my own exertions only. 

Your statement, that your advice prevented me from resigning 
on a former occasion, is equally unfounded. I have never, since 
my first admission into the navy, contemplated resigning; and, in- 
stead of being ordered, as you state, from the 1st lieutenancy of the 
New York, to the 2d of the Chesapeake, Commodore Ciiauncey, who 
was then flag captain, can testify, that I was solicited to remain as 
1st lieutenant of the flag ship: and I should have remained as such, 
had it not been for the demand which the government of Malta 
made, for the delivery of the pei'sons who had been concerned in the 
affair of honour, which led to the death of a British officer. It was 



25 

deemed necessary to send all the persons, implicated in that affair, 
out of the wavj and I went home in the Chesapeake, as a passenger. 
You have been pleased to allude to my havin;^ received the hospi- 
tality of your family. The only time I recollect haviu]^ been at your 
house, was on my arrival from the Mediterranean in the Congress, 
fourteen years past. You came on board, and dined with me; and 
invitfd the Tunisian ambassador and myself to spend the evcnins; 
with you at Hampton. I accepted your invitation. Your having 
now reminded me of it, tends very much towaids removing the 
weight of obligation I might otherwise have felt on this score. 

You speak of the good conduct of your ancestors. As your own 
conduct is under discussion, and not theirs, I cannot see how their 
former good character can at all serve your present purpose. Fortu- 
nately for our country, every man stands upon his own merit. 

You state that the '* Virginia delegation in Congress'' had present- 
ed a memorial in your favor. I would infer from this, that all, or 
the greater part of the Virginia delegation, had interposed in your 
behalf. This, sir, is not the fact. A few of them, I am informed, 
did take an interest in your case; but, being itiformed of the charges 
existing against you, of which they were before unapprised, tliey did 
not press farther your claims. From, the knowledge I have of the 
high-minded gentlemen that compose the Virginia delegation, if they 
would take the trouble to examine your case, I should, for my own 
part, be entirely satisfied to place the honor of the service upoii their 
decision. 

You offer as your excuse for permitting four months to intervene 
between our June correspondence (with which, from your letter, you 
appeared to be satisfied) and your letter of 23d October, your indispo- 
sition. I am authorized in saying, that, for the greater part of the 
four months, you were out attending to your usual avocations. 

[, Your offering your life to me would be quite affecting, and miglit 

j (as you evidently intend,) excite sympathy, if it were not ridiculous. 

,lt will not be lost sight of, that your Jeopardizing your life depends 
jpon yourself, and not upon me; and is done with a view to fighting 

i^t^our own character up. I have now to inform you, that 1 shall pay 
10 further attention to any communication you may make to me, 
thcr than a direct call to the field. 

Your obed*t servant, 

STEPHEN DECATUR. 
To Commodore James Barron, 
Hampton, Va. 



26 

No. 11. 

NoKFOLK, Januavj 16th, 1B20. 
Sir: Your letter of the 29tli iilt. I have received. In it vou say 
that }ou hi\\c now to inform me that you shall pay no further attcT!' 
tion to any conimunication that I may n)ake to you other than a tU 
roct call to the fieUl: in ans\ver to wliich J have only to reply- IHut 
.viicnever vou will consciil to meet n^c OKI lu'iv unu rcuoi g-rn m'ls, 
that is, sudi as two honorable men may 'Mnsidir ju.;t and prope*, 
you are at liberty to view this as that call; the wliole temu' of your 
conduct to me Justifies this course of j)roceeding on my part; as for 
jour charges and i-cmarks, 1 icccard them not, particularly your 
sym])athv; you know not such a feeling — I cannot be susnccted oi 
making the attempt to excite it. 

I am, sir, yours, &.c. 

JAMES BARRON 
Tn Com, Stepheiv Decatuk, 

If'ashingion. 



No. 12. 
^YASHI^GTo^*, January 24, 1820. 
8ir: I have received your communication of the 16th, and am dt a 
loss to know what your intention is. If you intended' it as a chal- 
lenge, I acce])t it, and refer you to my friend (;,jm. liairbridge, who 
is fully authorized by me to make any arrangement he pi *ases, as re- 
gaids weapons, mode, or distance. 

Your obedient servant, 

STEPHEN DECATUR. 
Com. James Barroy. 



No. lo. 

NoRruLK, February 6, 1820. 
Sir: Yoar letter of the 29th of December found me confined to bed, 
with a violent bilious fever, and it was eight days after its arrival 
befc re 1 was able to read it; the fevei*, however, about that time, left 
UJe, and my convalciscence appeared to promise a moderately quick 
recovery. I, therefore, wit)te you my note of the 16th ultimo; in two 
days after i relapsed, and have had a most violent attack, which has 
reduced me very low, but as soon as I am in a situation to write, you 
shall hear from me to the point. 
I am, sir, 
; I Your obedient servant, 

' " * » JAMKfcJ BARRON. 

Com. STF.rur.N Decatur, 

TFasiMigto:. 



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